


dulce de leche

by Emeka



Category: Summon Night (Video Games)
Genre: Background Erst Brattern/Ghift Brattern, Drabble Collection, Grooming, Implied/Referenced Incest, M/M, Romanticized Abuse, related but not chronological
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-04-12
Updated: 2021-01-20
Packaged: 2021-03-01 21:48:47
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Rape/Non-Con, Underage
Chapters: 24
Words: 14,598
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23614015
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Emeka/pseuds/Emeka
Summary: folth and his grown-up boyfriend
Relationships: Erst Brattern/Folth
Comments: 43
Kudos: 15





	1. sugar almond

**Author's Note:**

> couldn't think of a title for this so i let my cat walk on the keyboard (nvm). rip to erst's moral integrity, i know you (probably) aren't a shotacon but i must feed

Rain pounds on the roof and windows.

Sounds below intermingle sweetly. Breaths and moans, wetness, and the soft approach of skin on skin. The rain is so loud he can barely hear them, despite being an active participant in causing them. He likes it better when he can but it’s better for this situation.

This is his bedroom, in the middle of the night. His best friend is sick at home and his parents are sleeping just down the hall. The man spending the night with him is his best friend’s older brother, on break from work and reluctant for some reason to stay at his own house.

And his... well, lover, he supposes, though it embarrasses him to think of having such an intimate connection with the most amazing man he has known in his short life.

It doesn’t matter that he’s so much older, or that not even his parents can know about it. That just makes what they have more special.

The rain is pounding, and beneath it...

He gasps softly into the air, head thrown back, his mentor’s between his legs, sucking and tasting from thigh to tiny stiff penis. The swirling heat and movement feels better than any other sensation he’s ever experienced. Sex, as he’s come to know it, is a pretty amazing thing. It’s on his mind all the time that they aren’t doing it. In class, family dinner, playing with his best friend (he wonders more curious than jealous if his friend has done these things with his brother—and if not, whether he should teach him). It has changed his life more than any single thing ever has.

And the secret. But that’s exciting too, like the promise of thunder rumbling in the distance.

It’s just for them. His lower belly throbs in agreement, desire; his mentor’s hands wander to his butt, squeezing and pulling closer. His mouth is all over him, eating, tasting, sucking, _eating_.

If the hall light turned on—he comes, breath forced into a constrained near-whistle in his throat. For a few moments the sound between his legs increases with harder sucking to help him along, then the minute gulps of swallowing.

His breathing whooshes out and continues unevenly. Their post-lovemaking noises begin to mingle with his mentor’s slow, heavy takes of air. He wishes he could return his favor, but even with the rain, it’s a bit too risky to do anything too prolonged. All it would take is a peek while they’re preoccupied.

But he’s happy in this way. They curl up together front to front, all bundled up with an affectionate arm on his shoulder. Nothing inappropriate here. No reason to look for, and thus no reason to notice, their flushed cheeks and sweaty brows, or to make anything of their criss-crossed ankles.

The rain wails against the window. He can feel the storm coming, the vibrating through the walls, through the bed through his bones, but it can’t reach him in this nest of warmth.

He falls asleep with the rumbling in him and his dreams. In them he hears the rain too and again they meet together, flesh to flesh with no other cares. There’s no one else to worry about; it is just them, and the tempest.


	2. it's your mauve

His parents left the house to do their shopping. He leaves the front door unlocked to see what might happen.

The other day as he played with his best friend in the presence of his best friend’s older brother, he remarked offhand the fact and the timing of it. Whether anything would come of it, he couldn’t be sure. Erst might be noticed walking to his house, though as a friend of Folth’s and a young man known for being kindly and responsible, it would only be seen as a check-up at the most.

Still, it probably wouldn’t be wise... not to say his hopes aren’t still up.

He sits on the living room couch to wait, where he will hear any arrival before he sees them. Every noise outside makes his thighs twitch in anticipation. The pleasant tension between his legs says he’s hard, but it’s hard to tell by sight in his onesie. Of course some of it is thinking about Erst, and how much he likes him and what he makes him feel, but his own audacity is affecting him as well.

His parents locked the door behind them for his safety. With his own hands he undid the lock and bolt, leaving him vulnerable to anyone in theory, but with one man in mind. He unlocked the door for his grown-up boyfriend to come in and have his way with his bare child’s body.

He palms the vee of his crotch. Yep, definitely hard.

If Erst does come... he wonders what he’ll teach him this time. Everything he knows of sex and all of it he’s experienced has been through him. He taught him how to touch himself in front of him, how not to choke on his cock, the words to use for lovemaking, where his prostate is, and how to ride him. All of it; unbelievable that he had once been innocent of those things when now they are second-nature. And there’s more, he has no doubt, and so far he has been a good student, he thinks. Erst tells him so each time, that he’s a good boy who does so so well.

What would his parents do if they knew? Hate Erst. Pity him. He knows why their secret has to be a secret—but if he were them, he’d be glad. What other way is so good for learning sexuality? Far better a kind man like Erst, even if he is older, than some other clueless kid only looking to get his own.

His palm presses harder into himself and rubs slowly, back and forth. There’s rarely any desire to do this if Erst isn’t watching but right now he is so warm with his own bad behavior. The door is unlocked. Waiting, just as he is. For one man in particular, for a single purpose.

A little more. Blood courses through his body, thrumming his skin and his hard baby-handful of dick. His head falls onto one shoulder. His wrist begins to ache. If Erst strips him and finds his undies wet, would he praise or scold him? Praise, his intuition tells him. Erst always praises him when he acts like a big boy.

Even though he’s alone he still grits his teeth together as he comes, humping up into his hand. He’s a big boy, a bad big boy, masturbating in his living room in the middle of the day and hoping for his own ravishment. It’s better than any other time he’s fondled himself, so good he’s left breathless and a little faint once it passes. The palm of his hand and the crotch of his onesie are both damp.

The door handle clicks.


	3. bronzed glow

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> rip e.e.

“Do you know any poetry?” Erst asks one evening they are alone.

Folth shakes his head. If he had known it was expected of him he would have picked some up, but---perhaps seeing his consternation, Erst laughs.

“I’m not much for it myself. But I learned some to teach you.”

“Teach me?” he repeats, a little braver. It’s always fun to learn something new, though Erst’s lessons are, so far, in the physical sphere. “How?”

“You’re a tactile learner,” Erst says, placing a hand on one of his bare knees, “so I think this is the best way.”

His fingers move into the tender crease behind the caps, tracing out words that his lips mouth.

(may i feel said he), either the start of a poem or a question---one he should know by now needs no asking, then clarifying (i’ll squeal said she). The line makes his face heat; it’s the exact opposite of the reaction he had when he was first touched. Erst gives him a knowing look before continuing, hand sliding up only a little toward the start of the crease.

(just once said he) (it's fun said she) and Folth tries to fight off a fresh burst of heat in his cheeks. Erst never asked for just once---he’d been open in his affection for him---and it was quickly apparent how fun their activities together are.

His hand comes up higher, just starting to cross the border into his upper leg. The closer it gets the more every brush sparks through his immature muscles into his lower belly. (may i touch said he)---Folth automatically nods a yes---(not too far said she)

(what's too far said he) a little higher, still, just before the plumper flesh of his inner thigh (where you are said she)

Ah. His leg jerks when Erst’s fingers dig into his fatty baby thighs. There’s a look in his eyes full of savor and mischief. They squeeze in and out, massaging, before continuing the poem in (may i stay said he) (which way said she) any and every one (like this said he) (if you kiss said she) and that helps always; Erst’s kisses are like none other, wet tongue and hard teeth so overpowering it literally takes his breath away.

(may i move said he) yes

(is it love said she) _yes_

(if you're willing said he) yes--and Erst’s hand comes in close to his groin, nestled so tight to his innermost thigh his knuckles press into his little stiffy (but you're killing said she)

All that’s killing him in this tension. He mutters Erst’s name in a near-sigh. Erst laughs.

(but it’s life said he) (but your wife said she) but Erst has no wife but him.

(now said he) and finally his hand is where it needs to be, changed to a rubbing, palming, so he can say aloud, “Ow, said she,” and Folth whimpers.

“Tiptop, said he,” Erst says himself in a bare whisper, working, rubbing, smiling brightly. “Don’t stop, said she.”

“No, don’t--” so close now, so close…

“Oh no, said he. Go slow, said she.” He hesitates a moment like he might carry out this compunction before Folth grabs his hand and humps himself into it.

“Come? said he.” 

“Mhmmm!” he screams into his forcefully closed lips, shaking, hot, dirty-boy-good-boy wet. His eyes, half-rolled into his head, gaze dimly at the ceiling as his body’s intense convulsions fade away.

Erst’s palm feels comfortably distant as well. But his voice and cheek against his go straight through his bones. “You’re divine, said he.”


	4. bronzed peach

Late at night they go out for a ‘boy’s outing’. It’s the weekend so it’s okay.

They come to a little area he’s never been allowed to go to. Just a park on the surface, but he’s heard it called a make-out spot for the older kids, which Erst says is as bad as things can get in a small town like this. Knowing that, he thinks he can guess why they’re here. And why Erst made sure he was good and hidden in the back of the carriage.

“Isn’t it a little dangerous?” he whispers timidly. All he can see outside is the scenery around Erst’s silhouette, trees and bushes lit by lamp posts. Anyone trying to peep in would probably only see darkness, but they could do it so _easily_. “What if police come?” It’s not like they’re alone. Even in here he can hear all kinds of people sounds. Mostly sighing and giggling, with a whimper here and there. Rustles of movement.

“Breaking up teenagers doing a thing they’ll just do elsewhere isn’t worth it. And if it does happen, they’ll tell us all to break it up, not one by one.”

If Erst says it’s fine… well, he’s made it this far on his guidance. And it is exciting once he puts his worry aside. They’re someplace lovers go to make-out---young lovers, but that’s what they are still. “Does this mean I’m your boyfriend?” he asks hopefully.

“You didn’t know? Of course.”

Folth lays down with gladness in his heart, in this place of lovers, as a lover waiting. It’s the closest to a public acknowledgement they can afford that can’t just be passed off as a joke, and it’s still a secret from anyone else. But he has enough secrets by now to feel comfortable with them.

His shorts are pulled down over the curve of his butt as they meld mouths and limbs in the comforting shell of Erst’s coat. It delineates every difference in size between them; how Erst’s tongue and teeth suffocate his breath, and his knee in the vee of his crotch forces his legs out, and one palm nearly covers the entirety of his soft, undeveloped chest.

And more than any of that… more than all of that… the solid heat pressing between his buttocks. Bigger by far than anything he has dared to self-experiment with.

He doesn’t dare moan aloud in case his voice stands out as too childish but he breathes out softly from his throat, and eyes closed, soaks in the atmosphere. Just amorous teenage(-like) lovers doing as teenagers do. Horny and in love.

“My little boyfriend,” Erst whispers as he makes love to him, filling him up, rocking his body into the sheets. “My illegal, jailbait boyfriend.”

“Yes,” Folth says back, voice quivering with all the feelings he can’t express. “Like you. My… my boyfriend…”

His come this time is perhaps the sweetest he’s ever had since his first. They lay together after, curled up in his coat and watching the sky darken from deep blue to a sparkling velvet black. Erst gets up soon after so they don’t stand out as sitting here all night. Even the ride back, with the carriage swaying and creaking around him, has a sense of the romantic. He’s being taken back home after a date. 

The final kiss in front of his house seals it.


	5. midnight mauve

The very first thing Folth knew of adulthood (beyond his parents playing kissy-face) was from Erst, though he did not know it precisely at the time.

One night, as he had his best friend and his best friend’s brother at his house to stay over, a powerful urge to drink woke him from a sound slumber. Ghift lay still beside him, breathing so lightly he might be dead. The spot on the floor where Erst camped was empty, the blankets all pulled aside.

Maybe he had to get up to pee? Or sit out on the porch like his parents do sometimes? Folth is too young to stay out there with them for long when it’s dark, but if it’s Erst, maybe he’d let him stay out with him.

He had never been before where he wasn’t supposed to be, but he’s been around his own house on enough midnight creeps to know where all the creaks are. He did not find him on the porch, in the living room, or kitchen, and assumed he would not be in his parent’s bathroom. Back in his room, he saw a band of light under the door across his room. The spare bathroom, aka, his bathroom. Erst must have needed a pee after all, and he’d been so focused on the porch he’d walked right past.

Well, it was no big deal. Bathroom water tastes grosser than kitchen water. But his footstool for the sink was in there to wash his hands. Getting to the kitchen sink would mean dragging a chair without it. But Erst is so nice. He knew if he asked him for a cup, he’d get it for him. He went up to the door to wait…

and heard a voice-like noise inside. His attention perked to it. Was Erst talking to himself? Maybe he’s sleep-walking. He drew a little closer. Enough to make out a word.

“Folth…”

Definitely Erst’s voice, but it was funny-sounding. Low. Breathy. Maybe… maybe he was talking while sleep-walking, dreaming of something. He could not imagine why else he’d say his name like that.

“Folth… oh, Folth…”

A strange feeling came over him. All at once he had the sense that this wasn’t something he should be listening to. His heart thumped in his chest. A sick, floaty feeling settled in his belly.

Another sound grew, amplified slightly by the tile. Hard breathing. And his name! Why did it make him feel so funny?

He snuck back to bed, thirst momentarily forgotten. His thumb crept into his mouth for the first time in years. It’s so nice to suck. So nice to think of only sucking… but he could only fully alleviate this anxiety by cupping himself between his legs with his other hand. Between the two he felt almost normal, and quite sleepy again. Erst came back to the room a few minutes later.

The urgency of his thirst woke him again what felt like not long after, though the event that so bothered him is light years away. He went to Erst without hesitation to shake him awake. Erst was no different than usual, which made last night even more of a dream. He ruffled his hair and said, of course, like he knew he would.

When Folth drank from the cup given him, the touch of the cool glass reminded of Erst’s cool skin, when his knuckles brushed his cheek in parting.


	6. classic red

Folth wakes sick and tired to a shaft of sunlight in his eyes. He is content a few moments to be gross in his overly-warm, sweaty blankets, before remembering there is an urgent need to bathe.

Truthfully he should have done it last night. If one of his parents came in to shake him awake, he’d have an impossible time explaining all this. He makes a run to the bathroom, stopping only to peek down the hall. The smell of breakfast being made hangs in the air.

With the door safely locked, he undresses and eyes his body with relish. Erst and Ghift stayed for dinner last night, which afforded them only a few minutes together. Usually that means kissing, groping, things along that line that can easily start and stop.

On the pretense of saying goodbye and goodnight Erst stayed in his bedroom to denude him and brought out a small golden tube, similar to the many Folth has seen in his mother’s vanity. It twists; another tube appears.

Folth waits with wide eyes. There’s a feminine mystique to women’s things, both charming and incomprehensible. He is too well-behaved to explore his mother’s things, he has no sisters, and his peers are too young for more than dresses and hair ribbons. That a man can use the same items has never occurred to him. A kind of awe washes over him as Erst runs the flattened end of the tube over his bottom lip then upper, washing the natural pink-peach with moist layers of red.

His lips convey an unusual sensation of electricity wherever they press and leave marked. Folth’s collarbone, sternum, nipple, ribs, bellybutton, hipline, even the head of his straining mini-erection. Enough of this and he could come; he feels it with bone-deep certainty. The strangeness of the situation, the ritual, is so impressed in him he can barely breathe.

Erst stops too soon for that, but he meets his eyes with a look of mischief, like he knows it as well. The lipstick is faded and blurred over the border. He spits on his wrist and rubs the rest off.

“Better?” he whispers.

Pink-peach again. Folth gulps and nods.

“Make sure you take a bath tonight.” He winks before leaving.

Folth wraps himself in his blankets like a cocoon and reaches immediately between his legs. His first orgasm of the night comes within seconds of jerking himself to a thin wetness all over his fingers. He doesn’t have big gooey ones like Erst, and he didn’t used to have any at all; he’d shiver, dry, and that was that, but he can still go until he gets too chafed or tired. Either of those does not seem even a remote possibility.

He huffs and pants through six before he stops counting. He’s sticky in his hand and all over his body, rubbing against himself and the sheets. Red, transformative red, blush, eyeshadow, lipstick, and the mysterious ceremony of application. Over and over he sees Erst in his mind, the stick over his lips. If he asked would he make up his mouth too?

At some point he wore himself out. One moment awake, the next dead to the world.

He steps into the tub and washes slowly, fingers passing over the marks in loving remembrance.


	7. smokey rose

In their time together he has noted the differences in their smells. Erst says it’s due to their difference in age. He doesn’t know what this ‘puberty’ thing has to do with that.

But he knows that his skin smells soapy-clean, with a tinge of humanity that makes him think of milk and crackers. His watery semen is vaguely bitter, and his sweat is fresh, hot, like gently-heated linen.

Erst wears cologne that smells like apples and wine, honey-sweet. His natural body scent is heavy with body musk; when he sweats it grows three times as strong, though Folth could swear that it is more bitter when they’re just playing around outside, and more pleasant when they make love. Sometimes his semen is so acrid it makes his nose smart.

The difference in the strength of their scents is so great he worries sometimes. If someone could tell after they’ve been intimate…

“You worry too much,” Erst fondly told him. “We’re together all the time when I’m here. Even if someone knows how I smell enough to pinpoint it as me, that’s a more natural conclusion than us being lovers.”

Who would know Erst that well, especially lately when he keeps leaving? Just Ghift, probably.

Otherwise, when they’re together, he quite enjoys it. It’s another way of feeling owned by and connected to him. His scent evolves on his skin, blossoming as it overtakes his own. A sweeter body musk, a drop of honey, tinged with his personal sweat. Sometimes if they have been pressed together a while, he can sniff a forearm or his shirt and pick up a direct transference of cologne.

When he is alone in bed it surrounds him like a canopy. If he closes his eyes he can pretend Erst is still with him.

He knows Erst likes that that he is so young and cute---he tells him all the time. But when it comes to this he wishes he wasn’t. He wishes his scent was heavy enough to mark him in turn. He wishes he could make him smell like more than a whiff for a minute after like crackers, linen, milk. He is too young to wear cologne himself; and people would definitely notice. If Ghift noticed his brother smelled like his best friend… what would he make of that?

He wants Erst to go home and smell him in his bed, too.

He wants Erst to touch himself to it, as he does sometimes, when it makes him homesick for him.

“You’ll still love me when I’m big, right?” he asks quietly, shielding his eyes from the burning sun to look up at Erst. Its rays eclipse around his head.

“When you’re grown-up, you mean? Of course I will.”

He can smell the both of them in this summer heat. The smell of his flesh is practically visible in the shimmering air. The playground sun is cooking his legs. “Then… when I’m big, I want you to smell like me too. If you’ll really still love me.”

“I promise, Folth.”

Folth’s heart fills with satisfaction. Erst has always been a man of his word. He returns to his toys and continues playing, until he unearths a shiny white spider that scurries up his arm.


	8. iceblue pink

It takes a few months after they get together, but he gets eventually to stay out on the porch.

It’s too public and dark for ‘hanky panky’ (as Erst teasingly puts it) but he’s happy just to enjoy the atmosphere with him. He might get in a little trouble if mom or dad find him out here. That’s fine too. He gets into trouble so rarely he can puppy-dog eyes his way out when he does. Nor would they make anything of them laying so close together, Folth on top a grown man with his cheek against his belly. They are long-time friends. Folth is an affectionate child. Maybe he caught a chill in the night air. That’s all.

So for now he cuddles to his heart’s content, warm and cozy with only the thin layers of their nightclothes in the way of their body heat. The air _is_ cool, but too still to dissipate any of it. Erst’s belly moves so slow he’d think he was asleep if not for the hand lazily scratching his head. The penis that was earlier pressing into his ribs has softened by now too.

Every now and then he hears a gurgle in his ear. Mostly he hears cicadas doing their noisy thing, and a tu-whit-tu-whoo that still sends shivers up his spine.

They’re out there, somewhere in the dark. Cicada husks hang off his fence each year, one once on the outside ledge of his window. He plucked them off delicately and poked their burry legs on his fingers. He’s seen a few actual cicadas, but never one as it molted. Owls in his mind are storybook creatures, made in watercolor and wearing jaunty bows; nothing capable of making such haunting calls.

Above the tree-lined horizon the curtain of night has firmly settled in its prettiest color, a majestic dark purple. He likes it far more than the type of night that is perfect black, than the oranges and reds of sunset, the dark blue of sunrise, and the greys and robin’s blues of daytime. He likes the sparkling stars better than the fluffiest clouds, and the silvery-sweet changing moon more than the bright sun.

He has seen their limbs entangled dozens upon dozens of times. He can imagine how they glow, looking at his forearm, in the light of the full moon. His thighs are mostly bare, in his nearly outgrown sleep shorts, one resting between Erst’s legs, the other on the outside, the ankle of which tilted up so that the back of the foot lays against Erst’s shin, where it rubs sometimes, like a cricket. If he was bigger he could press more of them together and get all tangled-up. If he was bigger he could hug him all the way around, and match him inch for inch of skin.

He knows that will come eventually. Often, when he speaks of adulthood, Erst looks at him with an expression that is faintly pained, and tells him not to rush. He will be an adult soon enough, and then he will be one for the rest of his life.

And he likes this, too, the feeling of being little, young, too small to fit into place, not yet an equal but something to be protected. Of course, Erst will keep looking after him when he’s grown, even though he’ll be able to look after himself instead.

The knowing of how short childhood lasts, that he will only truly know when he no longer has it---how bittersweet, the pain in his chest.


	9. bistro burgurdy

“You look like a marshmallow.” Ghift.

Folth sniffs at this none-too-gracious response to his new winter clothes, and mostly as a joke, turns to walk back into his house.

“It’s cute! Really.” Erst.

That’ll work. And it’s the first snow of the year, so he’d rather be out than in.

The day is early and crisp. About three inches of snow fell last night, allowing the grey morning to open on an unbroken blanket of snow all over the town. A week from now it’s going to be dreary dirty slush pushed up against fences and piled up into high hills to melt morosely on the streets for days on end… but for now, his child’s heart is delighted. Ghift complains about it getting into his boots, but he smiles when he thinks no one’s looking.

He feels kinda bad Erst is out here with them. As far as he’s seen, adults only have one word for snow: annoying. At least he looks like he’s having fun, not that he’s here against his will.

They play together from morn to late evening, until their faces and bodies are numb through. Erst won’t let them skate since the winter season is nearly over, but they snowball fight (Folth wins every round, no doubt due to Erst’s clemency), build snowman monstrosities, and utilize their architectural skills in the making of an igloo that keeps collapsing.

On the way back home they stop in front of a cafe. They observe the cozy interior in silence. It’s filled with a warm orange glow and tables of customers all wrapped-up with steaming mugs and plates of golden-brown croissants and squares of fudge.

Erst looks between them. “Hot chocolate sound good, boys?”

They cheer.

He ruffles his brother’s hair (who for once does not pout) and sends him in with money for the order. Ghift’s spine is ramrod straight with responsibility.

As soon as the door closes after him Erst turns squarely to Folth, so that his back is all anyone can see of them from the inside. He cups his face with his cold, wet gloves, and smiles. “Do you know what I have in my hands right now?”

“W-what?”

“The whole world.”

Folth has no chance to act on his pleased embarrassment before he picks him up and kisses all over his face like an overeager dog from forehead to chin and from ear to ear. All he can do is giggle helplessly.

It’s a kiss-deluge of maybe ten seconds before he gets put back down. The cold air was already making his face burn. Now it’s positively stinging and singing with the sudden whirlwind of being so violently chafed.

He looks to Erst’s grinning, similarly blustered face, and tries to transmit all the love he can into his eyes.

Ghift comes back out not half a minute later, carrying a dispensable holder for their dispensable cups. He stops a moment, perhaps noticing they are redder in the face than when he left, then is in a good mood again by his standards, with a smile smaller, and more somber than his brother’s habitual one.

On the resumed walk to Folth’s house to drop him off, Folth mainly listens to them argue and tease. His cheeks tingle pleasantly as he wonders what hot chocolate out of Erst’s mouth would taste like.


	10. rose quartz

The first time he began to notice his own feelings, it was on a similar walk home on an evening so late stars had begun to dot the sky. He walked between Ghift and Erst, one of their hands in both of his.

It is a few weeks after the weird bathroom thing. He still turns it over in his mind, as one might mentally try to solve a problem, tummy squiggling as he does. He’s not sure what to make of his temporary bouts of nausea either, that disappear shortly after he stops thinking about it.

“...don’t you think, Folth?”

“Huh?” The biggest problem is that it creeps up on him. He doesn’t set out to think about it; it seems to drift naturally into his brain when he has nothing else to occupy it with. When Ghift and Erst get into it with each other, it takes a while for things to circle back to him even when he plays peacemaker. “Sorry…”

Ghift’s hand squeezes on his, prompting him to look that way first. “I’ve never seen you caught nodding before.” A triumphant gleam in his eyes says he’s going to be bringing this up for a long time.

“He must have been thinking of something way more important than us,” Erst agrees.

“N-no! I was just---” His head swivels the other way. Whatever else he was going to say is lost.

Perhaps it is just the timing of everything colliding; his recurring daydream, his sudden bewilderment, the ironic gentle teasing, and the soft evening light. Erst’s face stands out sharply to him in a way it never has before. The features he’d once call handsome, as casually as he’d call his dad handsome, now rends his heart with an outpouring of feelings sweet and bitter. The thought again of him saying his name, all husky and---needy---that’s the word---melts his insides. Just hearing it said normally at this instant would kill him. “Just---just---!”

“Cat got your tongue?” Erst opens his mouth wide enough to pinch the tip of his tongue. The points of his teeth gleam like pearls.

The view the gesture gives him makes him flush harder. He rarely feels it when he blushes, but the entire upper-half of his face is scorching. Instead of attempting a reply and embarrassing himself further, he stares down at the cobblestone and his shaky knees.

Ghift clucks his tongue in a smothered laugh. “What are you being so weird about?”

If only he knew. If he knew, he could unravel the whole thing and demystify it. This sudden onslaught… he’s always liked Erst a whole lot. He hopes one day to be a Summoner, too, like Erst is currently in school to be. But his heart has never beat this hard from seeing him.

Erst’s hand engulfs his.

He hopes it isn’t sweating too much.

They continue bantering. He listens, desperate not to be caught off-guard again. He dares a side-glance only during a break in the conversation. One side… Ghift is looking away, eyeing perhaps the storefronts. The other...

Erst is staring right at him, neither smiling or frowning, almost entirely blank-faced. What that nearly imperceptible hint of emotion is, Folth can’t tell. A split-second is all he sees of it before Erst notices him looking, and buries the unknown thing under a smile.

Folth does not look at either again until he reaches home, and then only to quickly say goodbye. He goes to bed with worse nausea than he has felt in his entire life. Thinking anything about Erst makes a fever rise in his body.

(Later, he does ask about that evening, and what that look had meant.  
“That was when I knew.”)


	11. vintage wine

Folth knows without asking that the situation with Erst and Ghift’s parents must be difficult; why else would they spend so much time at his house? Still, he has longed to see the room Erst called his throughout his childhood. What color are its walls, the bedspread? What old hobby horses are lying around?

It takes a lot of asking, and a lot of come in his mouth, before Erst agrees. And that’s just to see his room, not to meet his parents (“you’re too sweet for them,” he says absently, wiping a milky strand off his bottom lip).

He picks Folth up after dinner so they can spend the evening out and about until midnight, when he can sneak him inside. The time between is whiled away on walking around until Folth’s curfew, then in a carriage Erst rents so he can nap a little at what would be his usual bedtime.

He has seen the small town mansion plenty from the outside. In the shadowy dark is the first time he sees its innards, and maybe that’s why---the wide corners and open ceiling disappearing into the dark, but it feels cold and creepy. Not in temperature. Lacking emotional warmth.

Erst’s room surprises him by not being much different. It has the used but not lived-in look of a hotel room. Maybe he’d have to see his room in Savorle to see the personality he wants to see. Erst himself is silent for the tour, only pointing out where he can put his things, and the adjoining bathroom to brush his teeth.

It’s only when they change for bed he speaks to him to stop him putting on his nightclothes. “I got you this to wear instead. Put it on and go to bed. I’ll be back in a minute.”

He recognizes it immediately as Ghift’s nightshirt. No way is it just a look-alike from a store. It’s worn in the ways he knows, the thread coming off at the neck and the slightly torn hem from a playfight. And the smell embedded in the cotton when he puts it over his head… why? He can’t begin to guess why Erst would go out of his way to have him wear this. But it’s late and his sleepiness at this hour is engrained. He toddles into bed and finds comfort at last in this room. There’s an indent in the mattress he can feel out by hand, formed throughout Erst’s teenage years. His too-small frame cradles nicely into it.

He is not aware of sleeping, only of waking, and a hand down his boxers. He hmms comfortably, stretching it into a whine. He reaches back instinctively grabby for anything to comfort himself by holding; parts of a nightshirt. It would be easier to just lay here but he’s about to rally himself into an attempt to respond when he realizes the name Erst whispers in his ear as he fondles him is not his, but Ghift’s. It puts him so at a loss he goes completely still again. But his body stirs, despite his confusion.

Orgasm comes quickly. Erst laughs, pleased, as he dribbles all over his fingers. “Did you like that? This is what you’ve always wanted from me, huh…”

It must be a game of some kind. If _they_ were actually making love, Erst wouldn’t need to dress him up and play pretend. Then… he wishes they were? The matter of incest or jealousy does not occur to him---only an indelible curiosity.

He heightens the natural pitch of his moans and whimpers as Erst slowly, kindly, spreads his (not-so-)virgin boy hole open on his cock. Each pump drives him deeper into the mattress and his sweaty face into the pillows, filling up his insides, his tiny baby virgin insides, until he almost despairingly feels climax rise again. 

This time he sobs half-into his pillow a _big brother_ so foreign on his tongue the honeyed exoticism of it drips into and clouds his mind.

“God _damnit_!” Erst snarls and grabs his hair, pushing his cheek so hard down he can barely breathe.

All he can do is come about it, half-choking out still that delicious _big brother_ as his guts fill with a violent influx of semen. His insides flutter and squeeze. He’s never heard Erst swear before.

The next time Ghift wears this, it’ll be with the washed-out ghosts of both their juices on it. The realization sends him shuddering into another high.

Erst is sweet with him again when they cuddle afterward, as he gently teases the sleepiness in his eyes. Cute boy, bad boy, up past your bedtime. He uses the right name this time.


	12. iced mauve

“I know you know by now… but don’t talk to anyone about that.”

That’s all Erst says about the ‘Ghift’ thing the next morning. Folth doesn’t push the issue. He’s still trying to figure out how he feels. It had been… hot… when they were making love, but he’s calmer now. Mostly he wants to know how deep the game goes. Would Erst make it real if he could?

The possibility doesn’t bother him or make him jealous. They are brothers. Maybe Ghift has more right to Erst than he does. Now, whether or not he would want to be his lover too is another question.

They leave the mansion while it’s still dark, so they can wander until it’s light enough to return home. Erst must be thinking of last night, too. He’s unusually quiet, as he had been before bed.

When they pass an alleyway, he lays a hand on his shoulder and guides him into it.

He gets on his knees, so they are eye to eye. There’s an intense look to his. “I know you and Ghift are best friends, but you can’t tell him, either. You _don’t_ tell him things, right?”

“Erst, no.” If Ghift knew anything about this, he’d make it known. “Don’t you trust me?”

Erst stares at him a little longer, pupils quivering. Then his expression relaxes, his shoulders slump. “You’re right. I’m sorry. You’re such a good boy, Folth.”

He kisses his cheek as his hands wander. They’re so much bigger than any part of Folth’s body they can manhandle him amazingly. One palm covers a whole buttcheek. The fingers overlap just at the tips when he encircles his waist.

“Is it dark enough?” Folth whispers, leaning into his chest and wrapping his arms around his neck.

“We’ll be quick. I just need to reward you for being so good.”

His hand slips through the modest barriers of shorts and undies to stroke his little hole. Folth’s body aches and warms in anticipation. He loves his cock in every way, especially inside him, but his fingers are more dexterous.

He muffles his moans with his teeth set delicately in Erst’s shoulder. The first burn of penetration is always sweet, but it’s the ruthless finger-fucking into his boy button that turns his knees to jelly. It’s so good, always so good. Erst takes such good care of him.

“Gonna come?” he whispers sweetly in his ear. “Is my good boy gonna come? Come on, come, come on my fingers, honey. Every drop of baby-juice you have.”

He bites down. A scream rattles through his lungs and throat. Erst grabs him around the waist when his legs give out and continues banging him out until his undies are wet through with his immature sperm.

Erst wipes the sweat off his face with his wrist.

Later in the day, while his clothes are in the wash, he is sent a small offering of baby’s breath.


	13. crème

Folth curls up into Erst’s side, in the languid period shortly after sex Erst calls ‘the afterglow’ A heavy, tired contentment lays over his body, suffusing it with a unique satisfaction nothing else gives him. He could play and do chores all day and still not feel so sweetly weary in his limbs. Sometimes there is such a complete knowing of being loved it brings tears to his eyes.

Usually all tension has vanished as well. But despite his weariness there is still a needy ache centered between his legs. He does not feel ashamed of it, exactly, but it’s not like Erst doesn’t tend to his needs. He spends as long as he likes if circumstances permit (as they have tonight) sucking and jerking him off with his thumb and first two fingers. Then he finger-fucks him into a wet twitchy mess and his cock is so good, so big and fulfilling, it makes him come just filling him up. Each thrust makes his toes curl until his feet cramp.

This neediness comes often when he’s alone, with nothing but memories and thoughts to satisfy. He understands _that_. But right now he’s all sweaty, with his hair all stuck up and knotted in the back, and his buttcheeks are slippery with the semen dripping from his hole. He’s been fucked well and good. What is he supposed to make of feeling this way?

“Erst...” He knows it’s not as easy for him. Sometimes he can spurt twice in one night, but after once he typically looks as he does now, with eyes heavy-lidded. So he feels bad about bothering him for more. But even his mouth or fingers will do. “My peepee still feels weird.”

Erst looks at him, all squint-eyed and blinking hard. “Insatiable, aren’t you?”

“Sorry. You don’t have to put it in me again.”

“Nah. It’s cool. You’re a good boy.”

He rolls over on him like a big, sleepy cat, and slips his soft dick in between his thighs. Good boy, such a cutie, he mumbles, and their bodies rock sleepily together. You’re so sexy. So sweet. My cock gets so hard for you.

“Eeerst...” It’s nice, even in the minutes before it gets erect. The tension between his legs heightens in anticipation of release. His insides are good, too. It’s all warm and fuzzy in his chest. If only they could touch like this forever and never have to part. He wants to share his bed with him every night like his parents do theirs. He wants to hold his arm and lean close on the street. He wants to share the same straw from their drinks. He wants the bone-rattling sex whenever he wants it, and Erst himself, the personality behind the name, with the silly jokes and desire to do good for others.

It’s not fair he’s not old enough to marry.

Erst is hard enough to fuck him. He slips it in nice and easy, in time with his labored breathing. It is heaven to be pinned under him but there will come an age it will not be so easy; an age where Folth, finally old enough to marry, will be a strong young man himself.

This time when he comes he does not silently shed more tears, or sob daintily. He bursts into tears.

He’s embarrassed there’s no easy reason to give when Erst worries over him, if he’s hurt, did he do something wrong. He knows there is nothing wrong with Erst. It’s himself he’s not sure about.


	14. champagne

He tries to make sense of the aborted feeling inside him. Lately he has been occupied by thoughts of his impending adolescence, and what he will be leaving behind. While an intelligent child, he is still a child; his fledgling thought processes cannot make much of the more complicated strings that bundle together, like a knotted ball of rats, and go nowhere at all when he tries to find an end by following a thread.

How to break it down to its simplest parts, even if it means losing all subtlety and cutting the ball in half? So much of his life recently he has measured in terms of his secret relationship with Erst. It’s the measure he continues to use.

First, the stress of keeping a secret from the whole world that could get someone he loves deeply in trouble if it were found out.

Second, Erst has expressed love and admiration for his youth. He is a young boy and will be for a few years yet. But one day he will be grown; though Erst has promised to love him still, what will there be left for him to love?

Marriage is forever and ever. Would Erst marry him? Not later, but now, while the bud of his life is still closed tight and fresh. They already do the most intimate things a couple can do, and he wouldn’t mind keeping house, though he is not much of a cook yet. When he is smarter in the future he can see them working all day to make others happy, then coming late to a house he has made into their nest, and the dishes he makes will be just like his mother’s.

How else can he be sure that future comes to pass? Even if they can’t marry legally yet, if they can do it in secret, like an extended pinky-promise… it’s the only claim he can think of.

The next night they are alone together, he reassures himself again by asking, will you always love me? even when I’m grown-up?

And like he always does, Erst replies yes, and smiles in his hair. He takes his hand in his, the small mate that will one day be its equal.

Will you marry me?

Erst is silent for a long time. Folth’s heart beats heavy with dread of the upcoming rejection. If he can’t be with Erst… but what he finally says is, of all the surnames to pick up, you don’t want mine.

“We don’t have to _marry_ marry. Not yet. Not for a long time. I just want… to be yours.”

“Ghift and I share a name. That’s all that should exist.” He rolls over on him and kisses everywhere in range of his mouth. “But if it’s some kind of ceremony you want, I’ll figure something out.”

“Oh. Are you and Ghift married already?”

He presses his cheek to his and laughs, a dry, humorless noise that sounds like it’s forced from his throat each time his body shakes in imitation of one consumed by mirth.


	15. hot

Folth wakes to a kiss. An instinctual part of his mind knows immediately it is in parting. He reaches out blindly, grabbing a wrist before his eyes even have a chance to adjust to his brain switching on. “Nooo,” he mumbles, in a voice that sounds barely sulky beneath the sleep-haze.

“Nooo?” Teasing.

Fingers stroke through his hair. “No,” he clarifies. Keeping his eyelids open is a true fight. Each one feels like holding up a tonne, and he still can’t focus the eyes themselves enough. “Dun’ go.”

“Don’t go? It’s about that time though.”

“No fair.” His body-clock is pretty good about waking him up half an hour before Erst has to leave his bed. It gives them time to cuddle in each other’s body heat, and Folth something to go on for the rest of the day when they act like they aren’t what they are to each other. It’s not fair to face the world without it if he doesn’t have to.

“You know I wish I could.” He sounds like it of course, all sweet-longing, but that does not pacify Folth’s desires, only exacerbates them with the possibility of coming true.

“Pleeeaase?”

“Well… just for a minute, then.”

He rejoins him in the circle of warmth beneath the sheets. They could be happy as cats here for a long time. Folth immediately begins to drowse back to sleep with Erst’s chin on his head, and his hand covering the span of his back. So toasty. He’d been so toasty all night, but it’s hard to appreciate it when he’s asleep.

“Folth…”

“I had a bad dream. And you’re so nice. That’s all.”

“We shouldn’t test goodwill for me when we don’t have to.”

“Mean,” he sulks openly now, at the same time trying to embed this current coziness onto his mind. Erst’s heart beats against his skin. Every breath and rise of his chest presses into his sternum. “ _Mean_.”

“Just awful,” Erst agrees. “And thinking of you.”

And their future together. Of course.

He does not complain again when he leaves his bed. He pulls his blankets tightly around himself instead, to keep close his heat and scent. If he imagines hard enough they are still curled up together. Still lovers. On rare mornings he rises before his parents and he goes to bother _them_ for once. From the light in the hallway he sees their heads close together in the dark, half-submerged under the sheets. When they come up they are one huge creature splitting into two as their limbs become their own again.

He looks forward to that part of adulthood. They could stay in bed as long as they wanted, and it wouldn’t matter who knew or saw. Perhaps one day could pass like that in entirety, breakfast, lunch, and dinner, getting out only to make food and bathe together. Maybe a kid of their own to wake them early for a special occasion. Eventually. After they get married he doesn’t want to share him with anyone for a long time.

By morning light he is feverish and drenched in his own sweat.


	16. caramel kiss

“You and Erst,” Ghift says suddenly, by the cubby for their backpacks and coats, “are getting along.”

Folth’s heart skips a tiny bit. “Yeah?”

“Isn’t he a little old for you?”

A moment of eternity in silence passes. Folth readjusts one of his straps on his shoulder. “He’s your brother. Of course we get along. You’re always around, right?”

“ _Everyone_ likes Erst. He can make other friends. If he wanted to.”

Where’s the interest coming from? Ghift is often tetchy, but he’s never minded their friendship before. If he saw something he’d have said so. Is he suspicious? “Aww. Are you jealous?”

“S-stupid! Dummy! As if!”

Folth laughs. The uneasy feeling in his chest unties with relief.

Erst is well-loved by others. It’s a huge part of how they can be so close without anyone thinking anything of it. He supposes with such a shining beacon as an older brother, Ghift might fit into the ‘overshadowed little brother’ role. A single child himself (and, like Erst, someone who easily gets along with others), the situation doesn’t strike a personal chord. If Ghift were to air an actual grievance of the sort he’d only say with some sympathy ‘that’s too bad’.

They walk in the direction of their homes together. Folth’s parents used to come for him, but he’s big enough to walk a little way. Ghift’s parents have never come for him. Erst does sometimes, when he’s in town.

“He’s so cool,” Ghift mumbles reluctantly, staring down at the sidewalk. “He’s always sending these perfect test scores and grade reports… I think to annoy mom and dad. They don’t look at them, but I do. His teachers call him a genius.”

Folth listens quietly, only a noise in his throat to signal acknowledgement. Some of these had been shared with him, to awe over together. At those times at least, Ghift did not seem to begrudge his brother anything. He looked proud. _My_ big brother is _so_ cool.

“I don’t think there’s anything in the world he can’t do. Even… even…” He slows to a stop, and looks to Folth with such intensity he jumps a little. “You’re my best friend, right? Forever?”

“Y-yeah. Always.”

“You like me more than Erst?”

“Yes,” Folth replies, though the answer muddles in his brain. Is romantic love ‘more’ than friendly love? Did he lie or not? “Ghift, what’s wrong?”

“You two are always so… close. Hey, do you think my own brother likes you more than me?”

“Ghift…” Ghift’s eyes are shining and on the verge of spilling, calling him with love---whatever kind and however important it is---to slide his arms around his neck.

Their hearts beat together.

“You’re family. Of course he loves you more.”

“It’s our family he hates.” His voice is coldly matter-of-fact, but he responds with the same gesture of comfort. His cheek presses into his. “S-so… you have to like me more, okay?”

“...yeah.”


	17. yummy pink

They made their first step as a couple together a week from when he caught him staring at him.

On the race home from school Folth tripped and fell, scraping his knees into hamburger. It hurt pretty badly but he was a big boy, and with Ghift by his side they shakily laughed the accident off the rest of the way, arms around each other more for emotional support than physical.

He saw his parents before they saw him. They were talking out on the porch with Erst, who was probably there just to take Ghift the rest of the way home. He could definitely hear it when they noticed him. In a flurry of hands and faces was he brought inside, then his mother sat him on a chair to strip off his blood-soaked shoes and socks. Being washed and disinfected brought on a new searing pain to his knees. A few tears rose to his eyes he couldn’t blink away with everyone worrying over him.

After the worst of it was done they passed him off to prepare dinner. Mom and dad decided to calm themselves after their scare with food and a bottle of wine going around before the water even finished boiling. Ghift quietly occupied himself with a coloring book at his brother’s feet, and Folth’s dangling toes.

He’s never sat in Erst’s lap before. It’s firmer than mom’s, longer legs than dad. An uncomfortable warmth simmered in his body at so much contact, but it would be badly-behaved of him to refuse. The aroma of the red drink in Erst’s glass filled and stung his nose, adding to his discomfort.

As the sounds in the kitchen bustled and sizzed away the glass tipped close to Folth’s face, until he realized it was being offered to him. Was it a little secret, a condolence for his injury? His parents would be mad if they knew. But he didn’t want to hurt Erst’s feelings...

He pursed his lips and the cool glass landed lightly on his bottom lip. The smell inside went straight up his nostrils as the liquid traveled. Somehow just the acidic thick _roundness_ of its texture was revolting enough. Then his upper lip went numb in an instant where it touched the stuff, and he realized the taste reminded him of room-temperature vomit. The secrecy of the situation was the only thing controlling his urge to sputter, and swallow instead. It scorched down into his guts.

The glass was taken back away. Erst affectionately scruffed his hair and asked him in a babying tone if he needed any painkillers. He shook his head and leaned deeper back into him, all worries about his strange Erst-related feelings gone momentarily. His skin filled with hot cotton.

In a moment Erst started jiggling his knee. That’s something he usually finds fun---his dad bounces him on his lap all the time. But with each jiggle, over and over in the span of even a single second, his thigh came up between his legs and transmitted a jostly sort of impact into his privates. At first it still didn’t feel too different from a regular bouncing, but maybe because he was so cloudy with his first taste of alcohol, or because of his feelings lately toward the man doing this to him, it turned into a sensation he would hesitantly categorize as ‘pretty nice’. It turned all melty and sweet, like caramel inside a candy, and like sticky sticky caramel, spread up into his belly, chest, until his whole body was flowing in it. It started to feel so nice he wanted to make a noise, though he knew instinctively not to draw attention to himself at the moment.

When Erst eventually stopped he was not sure he wanted him to, even though his seat was getting a little uncomfortable with his house keys or something pressing into his hip. His whole body rose and fell with his uneven breathing.


	18. succulent cherry

He straddles Erst’s hips, peering down at the face he loves so well. Erst! His Erst. “About that one time...”

“Which time?”

He pauses. Maybe he should stop. But Erst only said not to talk about it with others. Between them should be fine. “The time I stayed at your house.”

“Ah...” All playfulness slips from his face. “Listen, that was---”

“Do you want Ghift too?” Folth blurts out, before he can change his mind.

Erst kisses him, hard enough that he’s biting his lips instead of only sucking, in a ploy so desperate even a child can see through it. It’s a ploy he’s willing to indulge, though. He loves his mouth being full and sloppy with Erst’s tongue and saliva. Even the pain of being bitten is nice.

He loves him so much... because of how much he loves him, he won’t be distracted. His lips are buzzing with pleasure when he manages to pull away. “Do you? Do you?”

“Folth... this sort of thing isn’t easy for grown-ups to discuss.” His eyebrows lower with concern. “It can even be dangerous. You know that. The less people involved, the better.”

“I know.” And he does, really. “But _do_ you?”

Erst sighs. His hands are firm on Folth’s hips, easily able to control him. He uses them to move his butt in little circles on his still-hard dick. “I was worried you might get jealous or upset.”

“’course not.” He wonders if he should mention that Ghift seems to be getting jealous of _them_. “You’re brothers.”

“I thought that might bother you, too.”

“Nope.”

Erst kisses him again. “You’re a good boy,” he says fondly. “And I guess that’s the thing. You’re a good boy, and Ghift is, well, Ghift, whatever I feel.”

So he does want him; probably before he even loved Folth. He doesn’t think he’s giving Ghift his proper due, though. He adores his big brother! No doubt he’d take the chance to be even closer to him. And Folth knew even before that Erst loved him back, beneath the ‘exasperated big brother’ routine. “I don’t think it’s impossible...”

“Shh. No more of this.” Another kiss, his teeth dragging on his bottom lip. “We’re already promised to each other. People don’t get married in threes, right?”

Then he’s rubbing him into him, his cock big and hard where he wants it between his buttocks, and with the idea of being ‘promised’ it’s hard to keep his head on straight. “Errst...”

Even his whimper is swallowed in his mouth. He wants so so much.

They rut against each other, Folth on top and nominally in charge, but in the grip of his lips on his lips, and his hands on his hips.


	19. sweetheart blush

Ever since the knee-bouncing thing, Erst has seemed strangely interested in his activities. Many times where he would have before sent him off with Ghift and a smile and a wave, he now wants to follow along. Ghift seems irritated by these new attentions (“butt out!”), and even to himself it is sometimes unwelcome. He feels so strongly around Erst that his presence chafes.

A day full of play has passed, which would leave him tired and delighted normally. He’s not certain if he really enjoyed it, though he is tired. The whole time he was too aware of Erst; where he was, whether he seemed to be enjoying himself, the sunlight dappled in his hair, the brush of their fingers over the water bottle, the inflection of every word he spoke.

He had been so focused on Erst that it is only on their way out of the park does he realize he has to pee quite badly. Normally there’d be no problem but admitting to something like that right now is… well, embarrassing. The pressing on his bladder is too urgent to wait for the walk home though, and if he wet himself in front of Erst he’d dig a hole just to bury himself in it.

“Um,” he starts nervously as they come up on the depressing drab-colored building, barely any taller than an adult. “I have to go.”

“Me too,” Erst agrees immediately.

Folth looks despairingly at Ghift, but he’s just wrinkling his nose. “Gross. Hurry up.”

They enter the boy’s section together; both stalls are mercifully unoccupied, but he realizes he’s being followed to the furthest one. Maybe Erst wants the far one. He pauses, but he doesn’t speak up for it. He slowly turns his head. Erst is smiling at him like usual, but he’s not sure what to make of it or him standing right beside him. “I’ll, uh… see you in a minute.”

“Actually, I don’t need to go. I just wanted a chance to talk to you alone.”

“Oh? Okay... just let me finish up.” He steps into the stall before another word can be said, but finds resistance when he tries to close the door behind himself. Then he’s automatically making room by practically hovering over the toilet as the one-man stall fills with two. The whole thing is so surreal he’s not sure how to begin protesting. His mind has quite literally gone blank.

The lock clicks close.

“I kind of felt like you were uncomfortable around me today. Is something wrong?”

Even as close to the toilet as he can be Erst’s body is pressing into his back and shoulders. So close he can smell him, a scent above the fake-clean stink even the neatest public bathrooms have. “N-no, not with you. I guess I don’t feel well.” His groin is throbbing so hard the arches of his feet tighten with the urge to potty-dance. The urge to release is growing so big he’s starting to sweat and feel nauseated. “Erst, I have to pee.”

“Okay. Then just go.”

The suggestion flies in the face of everything Folth has learned in his short life but he’s in no position to be picky. He pushes his shorts and underwear down enough that they are clear of the danger zone. A high pressure hose of urine immediately streams, first splattering against the bowl rim then into the center of the toilet water. Relief washes down his spine in a cool, tingly wave. 

“You were really holding it in, huh.”

“Maybe. I wasn’t paying attention,” he mumbles. For a moment he had blissfully forgotten his surroundings. He hunches over more out of a sudden sense of self-consciousness, but Erst is a good deal taller and can immediately see down his front with a little lean.

“You’re really small there, Folth. It’s so cute!”

Erst is looking at him! Down there! While he’s peeing!

Embarrassment makes his face hot and itchy, so maybe it’s also what makes his willy twitch. The stream sputters. “Errrst...”

Erst does not touch him more than proximity demands, but his breath ghosts against his scalp. “I was worried you didn’t like me at all anymore. You do like me, don’t you, Folth?”

He mutters an affirmative. Another wave of sensation numbs his skin.


	20. ying yang

Folth crawls down to Erst’s makeshift bed on the floor. He had to wait what seemed like hours before he was sure Ghift was asleep. Downside, Erst is asleep too, but he wakes easily as he gets into his blankets.

“Somethin’ the matter?” He raises the blanket enough to peer in at him. Folth’s night vision has long since set in, so he can pretty well see his sleepy face and cork-screwed hair.

Hie wiener has been stiff for as long as he’s been awake. It’s why he bothered depriving himself of his precious sleep. “I have to pee,” he whispers, rubbing his pelvis against his leg.

Erst grins. “Pee, huh? You can’t go by yourself?”

Well, he could. But touching himself and Erst touching him are two completely different things, like comparing a fireplace to the sun. It feels good either way but only getting touched completely subsumes him. “I had a bad dream. I’m scared.”

“Well, okay. I’ll go with you.”

Erst takes his hand and leads him to the bathroom.

The light is glaringly harsh after the intimacy of his dark room. He has to squint down to see, right at his boner pressing against his sleep shorts. Erst’s face fills his vision instead when he kneels in front of him.

“Ready, honey?”

Folth nods and pulls his shorts down. His wiener pops right up. Erst keeps eye-contact with him as he helps him out, one hand tickling his balls, the other properly jerking him off. Ahh... he leans forward, hands on Erst’s shoulders for support. He can feel muscle under his palms. Not a ton, but enough to give him a meaty squeeze. The want to come rises eagerly in his belly.

Erst says so quietly even he can barely hear, “You’re still tiny.”

“Mhm?” He’d pout but he doesn’t trust his voice to stay low. It’s mean of Erst to tease him for being small when that’s what he likes about him. His expression tries to say it for him. Erst’s grin widens.

He comes convulsively, toes curling against the tile and fingers into his strong shoulders. There’s still nothing from his wiener except a few drops of wet. It shakes really hard though, it’s got the right spirit. As soon as it stops he puts his arms all the way around Erst’s neck for a hug. It’s hard to breathe evenly but he manages a word of thanks.

“Anytime, Folth.” He covers the whole span of his back when he pats it. “Let’s get you back in bed.”

Folth nods but he sneaks a look down. Erst has gotten stiff too, with a way bigger boner than he is capable of yet. It makes his mouth ache and salivate just looking at the suggestive bulge in his briefs.

“No time,” Erst says, very quietly again. They link hands to leave the bathroom, too.

His bed is still faintly warm under the covers. It’s only been a few minutes past. As he settles himself back in Ghift nuzzles in close, something he rarely does, winding an arm around his waist. “Haveta pee?”

“Yeah.”

He waits for any further questions, but Ghift only mumbles ‘cold’ and rubs his cheek into his. A warm, fuzzy feeling makes him just as warm on the inside as he is on the outside.


	21. ghosted

For a few days following the bathroom thing his awareness of Erst sharpens to an unbearable extent (and he thought it had been bad before). For that span of time he does avoid him by hiding in his room for the weekend, but eventually he is invited out to lunch with him and Ghift. Something as direct as that is harder to put off, so he ends up going along.

Clothing has never particularly mattered to him but he gave his things an anxious lookover while he readied to go out. Do his clothes look good on him? Is he ‘cute’? ...he’s never minded being called that, but now the word fills him with a sense of apprehension.

He ends up in his usual warm weather wear. No sleeves and shorts, what he and every other little boy in the world has worn since the beginning of time. Nothing special. But as they walk down the street together he thinks he is taken special notice of. Erst is always looking him in the eye when he sees him. But when he speaks to Ghift, or just gazes at the trees and bushes they pass, he feels a strange weight over his nape, his shoulders and thighs, the backs of his knees. When he feels it his chest pushes itself out and his hands turn restless. They play with his hair or lace fingers behind his back, arching his front out even more.

His awareness of Erst is still painfully sharp, but thinking he has his attention makes him pleasantly choked inside.

They come to one of the few cafes in town, a small cozy building with an outside seating area surrounded by roses. Erst calls it a good fit for the day, and Ghift agrees without much arguing. It’s warm enough out that walking has given them a light sweat, but not so much that eating in seems vastly preferable. And out here, in the humid smell of roses, with these little round tables, Folth is not forced into choosing a side to sit as he is with booths. Usually he goes with Ghift since he’s the one who looks at him like he actually cares, but he’s in a funny mood today, and not too sure of any of his actions.

They go in, back out, sit in their seats, order ‘whatever you want, my treat’, iced tea and sandwiches and soup with the promise of dessert. Folth tries to sit as he has seen grown-ups do with one knee over the other, and feels very mature until he notices Ghift looking at him weird. He sheepishly lets him legs back down even though they’re so short the toes dangle inches from the ground. Maybe he can look---better?---older?---what exactly is it he’s trying for?---in other ways.

His eating mannerisms too follow typically those of a boy’s. Usually he’d be chowing down right along with Ghift, and drinking from his glass enthusiastically with both hands until his head hurt. But adults eat neat and clean, chatting between every bite. His parents in particular are slow eaters. Erst isn’t quite that staid, but he still goes about his plate with more control than Folth sees from any of his classmates. So he goes along at his pace and tries to do the same, although he knows next to nothing about the news and town gossip. Erst is still noticing him. He wants to make the most of it. Ghift finishes eating several minutes before they do, and huffs about them being so slow.

The waitress collects their dirty dishes. When she leaves, Folth feels a hand rest itself on his right leg. Erst’s side. His whole body gives a little twitch then he launches into flustered conversation about his schoolwork. It’s the only thing he knows he can talk about without really thinking about. The hand is demanding his attention, Erst’s big warm hand, just high enough that the pinky and ring finger have slid up the leg holes of his shorts. He can’t remember anyone ever touching him so high up his thigh before. Maybe Ghift has accidentally when they play-fight, but that’s completely different from this. Ghift is completely different from Erst.

Something strange plunges into his belly. It’s heavy and hot, tense, almost like hunger. Suddenly he is ravenous for... he’s not sure what. He wishes Erst would touch him even higher up. That’s close to what he wants. Thinking it makes his belly even tighter.

When the waitress returns with the bill, it slides off, not up. But he can feel perfectly the imprint of where it was, burning, tingling.

In his bed, he touches that spot and recalls just how it felt to have Erst’s hand somewhere than in his own, until that hungry tightness in his belly returns. He barely sleeps through the night as the memory recurrs with greater and greater heat. He thinks he dreams. In the morning he is drowsy with a fever, but no real sickness that he can tell.


	22. unsubscribe

A series of nights like that one follow. Sometimes his wiener sticks out but the idea of only using it to pee (and being a well-behaved boy who knows not to touch himself in public, and thus, not in private) is so entrenched in his mind he does not explore it. He cups his hand over his clothed groin sometimes while sucking his thumb, the furthest he’ll go, and is a little relieved.

Ghift asks to spend the night. He’s not really in the mood with this going on, but he promised Erst he’d look after him. And maybe he can use it, although the idea of ‘using’ a person makes him uncomfortable.

They’ve always shared his bed, since day one. The idea of a couch, or the floor, had never occurred to him. Of course he’d share the most comfortable place with his friend. If Ghift had expected one of those places instead, he hadn’t insisted on it, which Folth thinks of as a pretty good indicator as to his personality. Ghift has never told him ‘I like you’ in the easy way he tells him, but he still wants to be close at night.

It seems mean to think of someone else. Mean to think of Erst, and wish he were here instead in his bed. To think of his hand on his thigh. He can’t imagine a grown-up’s presence so close to him in such a cozy, personal space. He has never been told exactly why, but he knows there’s a reason Erst always takes the floor, and why it’s fine for him to sleep in his parents’ bed with them now and then, but one of them will never sleep in his bed with him.

If Erst ever crept into his bed... he wants to cup his groin again, but he wants warmth even more. Maybe he can pretend. He doesn’t think he could sleep a wink if he spent the night again. He’d be too hungry. Waiting.

He crosses the little boundary that usually lies between him and Ghift and throws an arm over his shoulder, hugging him close. Not his brother, not shaped like him, but still a hot body. Ghift sleepily protests and tries to push away, but he’s too far gone to struggle much and probably he likes it anyway. Folth snuggles his cheek into his forehead like he wants to into his brother’s chest, leg slipping up between Ghift’s thighs (and Ghift makes a soft noise that goes unheard, he is so lost in his head) and oh, Erst, right now he wants him more than anything.

Is his weenie sticking out again? He hopes it isn’t noticeable. Or at least that Ghift is too sleepy to feel it.

To his surprise Ghift holds him back, tightly for a second, then relaxes. It makes him feel bad. It’s sweet, but it isn’t his affection he wants right now. His arm is too skinny. But at least it fills him with more heat.

“Folth,” he mumbles, snuggling into him. “Stupid Folth,” but his voice is soft, gentle. “’s too hot.” His breath puffs against his neck.

His daydream of Erst is so intense he barely notices when he sleeps and dreams instead. There, he feels his hand on his thigh as real as he had felt the actual thing. They cuddle together, too, and Erst tells him in a soft croon that he’ll give him all he wants, all he needs, until he’s all full. He cups his groin for him, holding his entire sex in the palm of his hand and for some reason for that---he slides back up out of his sleep, shivering, but not cold at all.

His whole body is filled with something nice. For the first time in a while he is completely calm, the strange tenseness in his belly dissipated. Ah. Erst filled him up, after all! He even feels better than he normally does. He wonders what it is.... this soft, fluffy feeling.

He and Ghift are still tightly wrapped around each other, and maybe that’s part of it; being so close to another, especially one he likes so much. Even if it isn’t Erst.

The sky out the window is in the early blue of morning. Ghift is still asleep.

Folth kisses his forehead and settles back inside himself to do the same.


	23. streaker

A week passes and the temperature amps up. Folth and Ghift spend most of the morning on his porch, sweating and complaining about it. A heat haze lingers in the air. Erst comes by as he does so often now when he’s in town, and listens good-naturedly to his brother’s whining. Folth stares down at his knees until he leaves.

Erst returns maybe twenty minutes later with a slim box under his arm. And that’s how they all end up in Folth’s backyard hosing water into an inflatable pool. Usually the hose being out would prompt a waterfight but for now at least they are absorbed in watching the water level climb.

Ghift turns to him. “Share a swimsuit with me,” he demands. “I don’t want to walk home.”

“Geez, fine.” He doesn’t think underwear would be so bad, unless Ghift is wearing tighty-whiteys. Then again, he’s not sure he wants Erst to see his underwear. Swimming trunks are somehow less personal.

His reservation only goes one way. When he and Ghift walk out after a quick change (his mom reminding them to thank Erst, which Folth dutifully acknowledges, Ghift somewhat less so) Erst has already stripped to his skivvies. His heart jumps into his throat after the quick look he gets, and again his belly aches. A quick look---but he couldn’t help noticing his briefs, navy blue and snugly fit.

The water is tepid, like bath water run on too long. The surface glitters with the waves from their hands then feet getting used to the comparative chill. It comes up to his ribs just standing, but Erst is able to lounge comfortably sitting on his butt.

“It’s not fair you can sit---” Ghift starts before a wave of water to the face cuts him off. He sputters, then rubs his forearm over his eyes in a hard back-and-forth.

In the splashing that ensues Folth manages for moments at a time to forget that Erst is what he is to him---whatever that is, but his attention always circles around eventually to the fact of them both naked and wet and goosepimpled. He is seeing Erst as he never has any adult before. The softly rounded muscle of his chest and biceps, Erst’s muscle, his body, developed but not overly so. His everyday clothing is heavy enough to hide most of his bodyline. Folth might look something like that one day. Ten years from now, maybe, he’ll have the same flat belly and lean hips, all baby fat gone, the boyishly masculine forearms, the knuckles that stand out when he makes a playful grab for him.

They meet eyes often. It’s unavoidable when trying to aim. Can Erst see him noticing him? Is he noticing him still, even now? Folth feels he is a little inadequate by comparison, but he hopes so. He hopes he meant it all the times he called him ‘cute’ and finds charm even in his smaller, chubbier body.

Erst gets on his knees to extend his range and snags his little brother. Ghift yelps and scolds like a very angry crow as he’s lifted up into the air and shaken around like an infant instead of an elementary schooler. Folth notes with interest how easily this manhandling occurs and how helpless Ghift seems to be to fight it as his eyes follow the water trailing down Erst’s body into his sodden underpants. So heavy with water, he realizes suddenly, blushing and itching fiercely over his cheeks, that he can see the shape of his _thing_ outlined by the cloth. Geez, no wonder he called him small. Grown-ups get bigger there too!?

Once he’s released Ghift apparently takes serious offense to his inaction. “Some help you are,” he sneers, and tries ineffectually to push him below the water.


	24. worthy

“Be good for Erst,” mom says, kissing his cheek, then leaves.

The whole evening there was an air of impatience he didn’t think she was capable of noticing at all. All he could think of was tonight, and he knows it was the same for Erst. He kept giving him sharp glances as mom gave her last words of the night, where they’ll be, here’s where to call if anything happens, thank you, you’re such a dear.

Yesterday mom asked him if he thought Erst would like to babysit while they went out to a ‘mommy and daddy dinner’. He thought so, and while communicating this to Erst, asked if he wanted him to be ‘Ghift’ again. Erst swayed a little and went pale, had to brace himself against his fence, and only said that he would babysit. But Folth has guessed by those glances that the other answer is yes, too.

They watch his parents down the street, then Erst rustles through his pack of ‘babysitting supplies’ (the Brattern house has far less in the way of toys than Folth does himself, so it’s mostly snacks, coloring books, the occasional souvenir) and pulls out a familiar nightshirt. “Do you really want to?” he asks, not quite meeting his eyes.

“You didn’t ask the first time,” Folth answers, amused.

“Well... I should have.”

Folth dresses in the bathroom and holds the front against his nose. It smells strongly of Ghift; this must have been picked right out of the laundry basket. He waits about ten minutes in his bed, in the dark, either time for him to get drowsy or for Erst to work up his nerve. He has Ghift’s scent in the meantime. Faintly sweet, faintly bitter. He keeps his eyes closed even when the floorboards creak. The side of his mattress dips, his blanket is slowly pulled down, and there is another moment of pause before he feels fingers under his nightshirt, hooking into the band of his boxers.

He stirs, awaking, once they are past his feet. Erst is a dark blurry shape hovering over him.

“Bi... big brother?” The word makes his stomach clench. He hears a suck of air.

“Shh, Ghift. It’s just me,” Erst says in a low, soothing voice, like this is a totally normal thing to be doing. The mattress shifts and the shape joins the bed with him, prying his knees apart. This is so natural to Folth by now his natural inclination is to let it happen. But this is Ghift’s first time, and he’s normally difficult, even when he’s happy or wants something.

So he tries to pull his legs in, tries to push, whimpers, “Big brother, stop!” Erst is so much bigger, so much stronger, he doesn’t make the slightest difference. Something clicks, then hot slimy flesh slides between his buttcheeks. “Th-that’s gross! What do you think you’re doing?” It’s strange to speak to Erst like this, but it’s kinda fun, too.

“ _Shhh_. You don’t want mom and dad to hear, do you?”

Probably he wouldn’t. Folth hushes but redoubles his struggle as the pressure grows against his poor virgin hole. Big brother, big brother, he whispers shakily, and feels indeed virgin again, but also warm in a way he never has before with his faux-resistance. Erst pushes into him, so slow and thick he can barely take it. You’re so mean, you can’t, it’s wrong, his stupid dummy big brother is doing something to him he barely understands. He’s slow until he’s all the way in him, like a heavy beam of steel piercing his insides.

“You like it, right? It’s good, right?” Erst asks in pants between his quickening thrusts.

“N-no way!” But it is good, so much even though it’s gross, his brother’s penis inside his butt, lighting up his insides as he scrapes them. “Brother, stop, _stop_ , I hate you, I feel so weird.”

“Gonna come?” He’s bouncing into him, bouncing the mattress, making it hard for Folth to keep his moans behind his teeth. He wants him all the way up in his belly, has never felt so much like pure _sex_ before lying here getting fucked by his big brother, like something made to be fucked, like he was born for this exact purpose. He has been made so desirable he must be taken, even by force. “You can come on big brother’s cock, it’s okay, I know you want me so bad---”

(does erst really know? or is it the fantasy?)

Folth whimpers out that amazing title---if he can't marry Erst maybe he can adopt him into his family instead---big brother, big brother, and comes in a sob, so hard his entire body goes fuzzy and twitchy and is this one of the best he’s ever had? He feels so. Erst groans out the name he’s borrowed, and impregnates his insides with a deluge of sperm.

There’s no talk afterward, just breathing on and under each other. Maybe that’s part of the fantasy too. The knowing, comfortable silence. When in time they separate he is Folth again, and Erst tenderly cleans him off in the bath.


End file.
